Observations on politics, news, culture and humor

A bit of fun

I’ve been dying to mention New York‘s profile of Paz de la Huerta (warning: mildly NSFW picture, somewhat NSFW language) for some time now. If you don’t recognize her name, de la Huerta is an indie film actress and New York City personality. I first saw her in Jim Jarmusch’s trippy, wonderful The Limits of Control and was immediately hooked. It’s a great profile, just a pleasure to read…hers is one of those lives too strange to imagine. After reading it, I found myself both wanting to meet her and thinking she must be a bit of a self-impressed fake, but the portrait this profile paints is, if nothing else, difficult to forget. Some highlights after the jump.Let’s start with the intro:

The hairy bulldog ladles the coals, and Paz de la Huerta’s body disappears behind a wall of asphyxiating 120-degree steam. It’s a Sunday afternoon, and Paz, exhausted from filming the upcoming HBO series Boardwalk Empire, has decided to spend a few hours at a bathhouse on Fulton Street. “I needed this,” she says, exhaling a deep whistle, expelling the weight of the world from her lungs. “This construction worker I’ve been fucking has really been keeping me up late.”

As the steam clears, Paz begins to rub her breasts with raw honey and salt while twenty dumbfounded overweight men stare down at her from the bleacher seats, their guts hanging over their trousers. Paz forgot to bring a bathing suit and borrowed a “granny bikini” from the lost and found; unsatisfied with its loose fit, she opted for a towel that has now disappeared. As the only nude bather in the entire facility, Paz is remarkably comfortable among the ravenous, Wile E. Coyote eyeballs. Our neighbors look in my direction with “get a hold of your girl or we’re going to take her from you” glances. Having known Paz for a few years, I would warn them to proceed with caution, because Paz would like nothing more than to start a riot. With deep, tenderizing motions, she continues to knead her breasts while loudly discussing her most recent romance. “I think I’m attracted to outlaws because they make me feel safe inside, like a little child.” She drifts into Carmen—“L’amour est un oiseau rebelle, que nul ne peut apprivoiser”—and then translates for her audience, “Love is a wild bird that doesn’t obey the law.”

Just to fill out that scene a bit better for you, I should say that Paz de la Huerta is a woman of stunning beauty. In the Jarmusch film I mentioned, she spends nearly every moment on screen nude, but it is still her face that you end up noticing most. A thick mane of black hair you could find only in Spain. Dark eyes made even darker by their contrast with creamy skin. A soft, perfectly formed nose resting above delicate lips covered in dullest-dark lipstick. A curiously appealing permanent expression of confusion mixed with disdain. Now imagine a woman with a face like that and the body of a model disrobing in one of those sleazy old New York saunas in the presence of a flock of sleazy old men.

Paz’s childhood was spent visiting art galleries in a baby stroller and dancing to classical music in the family’s living room. At 5, she painted a book entitled “The American Mansion,” a fantastical collection of buildings, houses, and furniture. She insisted on wearing only silk underwear, and had a preference for antique lingerie. Her father bought her a $200 French bed for her dollhouse and elaborate flamenco costumes, though throughout much of her childhood—especially during a protracted dispute with his relatives in Europe—he couldn’t support the family. Abusive and often drunk, he would disappear for days on end.

I elbow my way through an art show at Collective Hardware, an art co-op on Bowery that is teeming one Wednesday night with socialities, hipsters, and trust-fund shamans. There is a private party in the fourth-floor bedroom. Near the entrance, a disheveled older woman is playing YouTube videos of herself onstage twenty years ago, claiming that Lady Gaga “hijacked” her style. Knocking over ashtrays, stepping over surviving members of Warhol’s Factory, I pass through the Chinese partition where Paz is holding court over a group of aspiring actors, a black druid robe covering her face.

She shoots me a sharp glance from beneath her hood, then returns to the crowd, continuing a monologue about her performance in Enter the Void. “It was a twenty-minute, one-take scene. My character is having sex with the strip-club manager and then answers the phone to hear that her brother’s dead,” Paz says. “It was pretty intense.” Then she clenches her lip, looks in my direction, and says, swaying from side to side, “I’m hungry, but I’m broke.”

Another good bit:

“Let’s go to Lovely Day,” she suggests, walking down the street in her new dress and a scarf I have let her borrow. “I’m hungry. Do you have any money?” At Lovely Day, Paz explains to the waiter that she wants her eggs “crispy on the edges, but not to the point that they become brown.” The waiter shakes his head and explains that “the chef just won’t understand that.” Paz grabs the waiter’s pen from his shirt and draws a detailed outline of a sunnyside egg, lightly shaded around the edges. “That’s how crispy,” Paz says, handing him the napkin.

I’m hooked. I don’t like irresponsible people and attention-seekers very much, but Paz de la Huerta seems like just enough of an absurd weirdo that I could get past the bad.